Santa Maria delle Carceri

Frommer's Review

This was the first centrally planned templelike church of the High Renaissance (1485-1506), a not entirely successful exercise in Brunelleschian theoretical architecture by Giuliano da Sangallo. The light plaster walls with pietra serena accents and Andrea della Robbia friezes and tondi are still pleasantly evocative, but the place somehow leaves you cold. The interior contains a St. John the Baptist statue over the font by the architect's son Francesco and the miraculous small 14th-century fresco of the Madonna with Child and Two Saints the church was built to house. The basilica's stained-glass windows were designed by Domenico Ghirlandaio.

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